Yoga for Scoliosis Teacher Training

This Yoga Teacher Training is unique. There is nothing like it within Australia. With its unique blend of yoga, embodied anatomy and embryology informed process, developmental movement integration, spinal embryology, anatomy pathology and research, there is nothing quite like it in the world. Truth.

Yoga for Scoliosis, Back Pain, & Spinal HealthStudent and Teacher Professional Development Trainings.

image credit graham woodward uk 2012

Training Teachers and Students within the physicality of a spinal asymmetry is sacred work. Every one of us has a midline. Every human, coming into Form, has a light and fluid filled, spine. We are, as one of my spiritual Mentors, Hiro Boga puts it, “living wands of Alignment”. Spirit, made flesh.

These Trainings are unique, with a signature blend of yoga, embodied anatomy informed process, developmental movement pattern integration, spinal embryology, anatomy pathology and research, together with Photographic Image reference to the body as felt known Place. There is nothing like it available. Truth.

When & Where is the next Training ?

The next Teacher Training is currently available as a flow on from one of the live Workshop Events in: Finland May 12-15, or Kent May 18-19, or Brussels May 25-26.

Training is open to Yoga Teachers, Complimentary and Alternative Medicine Practitioners, and to Yoga Students with scoliosis or spinal asymmetry who want to explore practicing with safety and efficacy, in which case, a minimum of 6 months consistent and appropriate yoga practice is a pre-requisite. Trainings offer information in learning how to practice yoga within a scoliotic terrain safely, with the intent of enquiry, always searching a sense of both the integrated spine, together with functional balance and symmetry about an energetic midline.

IMPORTANT: please note that the study of yoga with scoliosis is a deep journey over many years; these Trainings offer an Introduction to this pathway. Will these Trainings equipt you to support students with scoliosis? Yes. And, please note, there is a Practicum and Assignment requirement to the Training, essential to your application and integration of the material.

'Narelle’s teaching has come from decades of self enquiry within her practice, working with respected teachers, ongoing studies around spinal anatomy and embryology, and an underlying quest for knowledge around functional anatomy in the terrain of the scoliotic spine. This program offers an exceptional insight into the way that our bodies are and how they move and from where they have come. In that knowing we can work with our body in a compassionate and purposeful way to assist in altering the structure and or its supports in scoliosis. This in turn offers a roadmap from which the student can start their own exploration and self management.' - Maree, Director of Yoga Heart.

Included in the Yoga for Scoliosis Training:

What is scoliosis?

What the scientific research tells us about this physicality and its physiologic impact,

Yogasana. Specific prop usage, with application on the trestle and in the wall ropes, as these are available within certain Training Studios. Home adaptations will be explored. (*Note: These props may not be available in certain Training locations).

IMPORTANT NOTE: A research Assignment and a student Practicum is integral to your full Completion of this Training. Allow four months for completing this work. Know that two Private Mentoring Sessions are included for you within this process.Fees for your Assignment & Practicum component are separate to Workshop attendance Fees.You will have also access to - and indeed do need to complete - the online program EASS-y for full Training.

The initial part of the Training focuses on principles of practice in scoliosis, and on supported and/or modified standing asana in particular. We explore how we can facilitate proprioception, sensory balance, and invite developmental movement re-patterning, along with strong, clear penetrative work to generate potent change in the architecture of the spine. Acknowledging the body's layers of organs, fluids, muscle-fascia-bone, we will investigate the ways the thoracic and lumbar spinal geography can be re-in-formed, offering new movement and sensing choices in functionality.

Please Note: this Training is NOT offered as a complete Yoga Teacher Training. It represents an opportunity for Yoga or Pilates Teachers, and CAM/Bodywork Practitioners to professionally develop their skills. It also represents an opportunity for yoga students to dive deeper and learn more about practicing within a scoliotic terrain!

'I felt privileged to be taught by a teacher with such experience and understanding of how our bodies move, and was greatly inspired by Narelle's ability to help the student find their own way - guiding, suggesting, assisting, supporting, questioning. This has been one of the gifts for me from this training - observing and learning how best to support the student in their own growth.' (Maree)

When

Training and Professional Development Activities are currently offered as a Series of Two Workshops in Kauniainen, Finland, and/or an independent Weekend Workshop in Kent, or Brussels. Whilst not a Training in themselves, these Events place you in a position to learn a great deal about Yoga for Scoliosis & Backcare, and Bones as support tissue within Asana. For Training, you will need to complete the Practicum component and research Assignment, along with the online component, EASS-y. Note that the two Mentoring Sessions included within your Training journey, can easily be undertaken via Skype.

Read a little of Other's experiences

I was drawn intuitively to this training. The moment I read the course description I just felt it was something I needed to do and would benefit from. My husband wanted to know how I would use the course after I had completed it, and I really couldn't give him any concrete answers. I am so grateful that he trusted my intuition and my deep knowing that it would be a course that would transform my life on many levels.

My practice now is really about re- calibrating the architecture of my body, and understanding how that impacts on my asana practice, my emotional body and my spirituality. I feel my practice now is about re configuring the map of my own terrain and that process demands a higher sense of awareness and sensitivity.This in turn has impacted the way that I teach. I have scaled back the sequence of asana to re establish foundations - particularly in standing poses. I am finding I am spending a lot more time teaching about the integration of legs into the pelvis to create lumbar stability, and we are spending more time in Tadasana, which offers me a great opportunity to observe my students and really see their bodies and how they are holding / supporting themselves. I feel more confident in observing my students than I did prior to this course.

I am growing in awareness as a teacher and by simply having a deeper understanding of basic anatomy has helped me in inviting students to become more familiar and compassionate with their own bodies.

My body was often a source of frustration for me. Often the more yoga I did, the more my back ached. I couldn't understand why over years of practice in some asana I never really impacted my level of flexibility. In my awakening understanding of my spine's shape and how my body compensates for those shifts, I have more compassion, and am learning new ways of building strength and length where I need it.

I would highly recommend this training to all yoga teachers who are serious about guiding students in a practice intent on developing a deeper connection with their Self through heightened awareness of their physical landscape. This training offers a palette of asana and pranayama that can be individualised to enable the student with scoliosis to open and lengthen, create spaciousness and awareness, to embody wholeness in a body that often feels like a bewildering puzzle.

I would recommend this training to anyone with scoliosis and or back issues and a yoga practice, who wants to empower themselves in self-management. I would recommend it to any yoga teacher who has students in their classes with back issues (everyone!) And from my own experience I would highly recommend it to any yoga teacher who has recurrent niggling back pain, or who suffers aches after certain asana to invest in this training - it may possibly change your practice and your life.

I loved your no nonsense style of teaching. I loved that you challenged us, and made us think and made us work it out ourselves (even though sometimes I wished you didn't !) I loved the sense of safety I felt in our small circle of women, all invested in helping ourselves and each other through these uncharted waters. I loved the meditations and your use of language that so beautifully freed the mind from it's earthly moorings and allowed it to move beyond the perimeters of our known shape. I know that it has, and will continue to, impact on the way that I teach, and what I want to teach. But most importantly I am grateful for the way this training has heightened my awareness of self, and reminded me of yoga’s power to heal.

I have an awareness of my body now that I did not have before completing this course. My body is changing and I am amazed by the wonderful feeling of space - in the mind and in the spine - that is accompanying this change!

In my teaching, I want to bring this experience and awareness that I feel in my own body to those in the class - I want every asana to be an experience for the student! As I explore incorporating more props, I think about the purpose of doing each specific asana; what will it give to that student? How can it benefit the class as a whole? My classes have more purpose; and from the feedback I am getting after class, my students are benefiting from the experience.

I am deeply grateful and feel honoured to have been able to work with a teacher that knows what it is to live with scoliosis. What particularly worked well in the training was having people with a different and varying scoliosis in their spine. Having those with a scoliosis and hearing the feedback of hearing how each asana experience feels for them was of great value.

- Jenny Warburton Yoga teacher, Warner Qld.

I have noticed amazing changes. I feel like my spine is physically shifting. It has brought a sense of greater calm into my system and I actually feel like I am experiencing joy once more.

I have known about my scoliosis since I was 13 yrs old, but I never really thought it was significant enough to impact my life. I now know that it has impacted me greatly, particularly on an emotional level. I found the emotional and mental impacts of scoliosis so beneficial to understand - it was such a relief to know why I feel like I do and have done for so long - the disorientation and confusion, the lack of awareness of my body in space. I feel like I have been disorientated for such a long time and I have now found a sense of self which offers me comfort and groundedness. This in turn impacts my teaching, and helps me to bring more awareness and empathy when working with others.

Working in the legs was a specific part that was very significant for me. Working within my concavities and convexities has invited freedom into my body and my life. Each component in the training built on what we had previously learned.

I had been living with hip pain every day, knowing that I was pushing my yoga too far, but not wanting to compromise as I had this perception of what yoga looked like, especially if I wanted to teach it. Now I feel like I have gratitude for my body, to work within modifications that support me. Surprisingly, or not, my pain has lessened and the physical structure of my body is changing much more significantly with the modified supports. I am also much more confident in my ability to make adjustments that work with the body, rather than forcing against it. I have learnt more gratitude and patience.